At COP17 the world kept talking as the temperature keeps rising

Rescuing COP17 from collapse at the last minute with a bare minimum deal, we have defended our chance to create the world we want to live in and to secure the safe climate we need.

The Kyoto Protocol – the only binding climate law the world has – survived the Durban talks, but lacks key countries and suffers from weak rules as well as major loopholes.

However, the door to keeping global warming below the danger-threshold of 2˚C remains open – just. Now governments must work much harder, as COP17 didn’t deliver the actions we need so urgently.

Amidst all the focus on saving the Kyoto Protocol and securing a mandate for a future treaty, Durban made little progress towards cutting the emissions that pollute our atmosphere and cause runaway climate change.

Current emission trends put us on a dangerous pathway to warming levels of 4˚C or more, and there is nothing in the Durban outcome that forces governments to make deeper cuts faster.

The devastating consequences for human civilization and all life on Earth are already evident and getting worse, especially on the vulnerable African continent that hosted these talks.

With slow progress in Durban, adaptation to climate impacts that are no longer avoidable is now becoming increasingly urgent, and funding this as well as low-carbon development must become a global priority.

The good news that Durban agreed the Green Climate Fund is compromised by the fact that governments failed to put any money in it.

An empty fund is an empty promise in the face of the urgent and pressing needs of those fighting for survival in the most vulnerable countries around the world.

To protect livelihoods and save threatened lives, work to increase ambition levels needs to start immediately, and can’t wait till 2015 or 2020. Any further delay is so costly that humanity simply cannot afford it.

Governments back home in capitals have to solve it, but we have a role to play in holding them accountable. We can’t allow them to continue at Durban pace, and we can’t rely on UN talks alone to solve the climate challenge.

Every country needs to take bold and urgent action at home in order to move forward into the low-carbon age, but for progress towards a strong global regime especially blockers like the US and Canada need to step aside.

A much stronger outcome in Durban would have been possible, driven by ambitious proposals put forward by African, Least Developed, Small Island and European countries.

However, especially the US worked to put the world on a dangerous 4˚C trajectory, while countries like Canada, Japan, Australia and New Zealand dragged their feet from start to finish.

China and India showed flexibility, but European and BASIC countries missed an opportunity to forge a leadership coalition and leave the US behind in order to secure a stronger outcome.

Civil society will tackle the laggards and the vested interests they serve, ensuring that all governments put people before profits.

An impressive display of public pressure in Durban and via petitions from around the world has shown that the climate still counts – despite the economic crisis.

We now have to use every tool in our toolbox, go back to our capitals and fight for the change we need, boosting action from the bottom up, while working to strengthen the top-down regime in the UN talks.

Importantly, we need to engage Heads of State and relevant Ministers to ensure climate change is discussed in all relevant political fora and sectors of society, working towards a climate treaty for all nations asap.

The G20 Summit in Mexico and the Rio+20 Earth Summit next June can help galvanize concrete and immediate action by governments, businesses and communities. We can and have to do better than Durban.

Durban was a missed opportunity to secure a much stronger boost in the fight for a safe future for people and nature, for a world where low-carbon development and a stable climate allow everyone to live well.

That’s the world people want and the future we are all working for. A stronger outcome could have been a catalyst for all the positive action that’s increasingly happening from the bottom up.